Rediscovering You
by Cyndi
Summary: Life is about creating memories within moments, and those memories keep us afloat in this sea we call 'time.' .o. Danceverse, OptimusxMikaela .o. Takes place within the events of New Normal.


Author's note: This is a deleted love scene from _New Normal_. I took it out after I realized it was disrupting the flow of the 'voiceover' monologue near the end. I didn't want to outright banish it from my computer, so I saved it and added scenes to the beginning and end to make a ficlet. So, technically, this is taking place inside _New Normal_. Fic-ception, anyone?

Pairing is OptimusxMikaela.

_**Warnings: VERY, VERY NSFW and CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR**_** AOE.**

Keep something cold nearby and enjoy!

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**Rediscovering You**

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"_You're the bravest of hearts, you're the strongest of souls.  
You're my light in the dark, you're the place I call home.  
You can say it's all right, but I know that you're breaking up inside,  
I see it in your eyes.  
Even you face the night afraid and alone,  
that's why I'll be there_."

-Celine Dion, "If That's What It Takes"

.o

_"...No! No! No! It's not supposed to happen this way! I'm supposed to go first. I've always been ready to go first! I-I don't think I can take this! I-I don't think I can take this! I-I just wanna hit somebody 'til they feel as bad as I do! I just wanna hit something! I wanna hit it hard!"_

Sally Field's outburst glowed on the widescreen high definition TV set across the room. _Steel Magnolias_, a classic. Chick flicks and romantic comedies were Optimus' guiltiest pleasure, same as Mikaela's liking for eighties music. Mikaela didn't tease him about it like she usually did when he chose tonight's film. He picked something nonviolent to take his mind off recent events.

Mikaela and Optimus curled up together on the king sized bed in the master bedroom. Well, Mikaela sat cross-legged; Optimus' human-sized hologram reclined with one hand folded behind his head. Due to his height, his feet extended almost twelve inches past the foot of the bed.

Squirming, Mikaela tried to reach an itch between her shoulder blades. The irritating tag stub in the back of her blue tie-dyed summer dress kept digging into her skin.

Servos whirred and Optimus' hand gently scratched the itch for her. His new robot mode gave him amazing fingers- wider front to back, but narrower from side to side and bearing tips akin to rounded-off Philips screwdriver heads. They made the most amazing back scratchers, she realized, as she leaned into them without taking her eyes off the TV.

Being a mom _really_ made the movie's funeral scene more powerful. Mikaela blinked a rebellious tear away as Optimus' hand stopped scratching and flopped onto the bed behind her.

"Didn't Sally Field get an Oscar for-" Mikaela glanced over her shoulder. "Oh."

Optimus had slipped into recharge. The metallic 'doorstop rattle' he generated when relaxed- his equivalent to snoring- was noticeably absent. Maybe this new robot mode resolved the air turbulence responsible for the noise.

Mikaela tilted her head, studying Optimus' recumbent form. The plating making up his face went from a complex mosaic to simple horizontal strips vaguely reminiscent of cat whiskers. They marked his nose like snarl lines, creating an almost perpetual frown despite his silvery-black eyebrow ridges resting in neutral straight lines. All in all, his face lost some of the friendly benevolence still residing within his Spark.

And his armor- his general shape- Mikaela felt free to take it all in while he rested, unaware.

Instead of boxy chest plates bearing windshields, he had two small red and blue breastplates ensconced among the components normally hidden underneath. Everything was packed tighter together around his Spark chamber. No doubt an adaptation to make it harder for Earth's weaponry to harm him at full size, but it gave his body a more _human_ silhouette. She really liked the metal collar framing his throat.

Mikaela picked Optimus' hand up, kissed it and laid it across his stomach. He didn't stir.

Once, after a two week stint at Diego Garcia, he drove all night just to wake her up and make passionate love to her at three in the morning. She spent the next day exhausted because she'd been awake until one-thirty with a colicky and cranky Elita, but she didn't regret a thing. Especially since he played "I Drove All Night" by Cyndi Lauper during their steamy rendezvous. She _still_ blushed whenever she heard that song.

_I think it's high time for a little payback right now_...

Reaching out, Mikaela pushed the metal piece protecting Optimus' Spark chamber upwards and leaned forward to kiss him.

BANG! The armored hinge slammed shut again, narrowly missing her fingers. Optimus grabbed her wrist in a vice grip and his eyes flew open like supernovae blazing around pinpoint pupils.

"Optimus!" Mikaela jumped, heart pounding.

He blinked and his grasp relaxed. Horror crossed his face. His burning optics dilated and cooled to their usual soft azure.

"Just a reflex." He pressed a hand to his chest. "Mikaela...I-I apologize for my behavior. Did I injure you?"

"No, you didn't." She glanced at her wrist, which wasn't even bruised.

Of course. It had been four years since a human touch meant anything good to Optimus. He sat on the edge of the bed, gauntleted forearms propped across his thighs.

"God, Optimus, I'm sorry." Mikaela felt like a total jerk for trying that. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. I was- dreaming." Optimus' low voice created a chord in the quiet night air.

Cybertronians dreamed in a different sense than humans. Optimus once explained how recharge let his systems defragment, compress and compartmentalize the data in his memory core. Sometimes, the compression process caused random data tracks to open. While he didn't dream of illogical things like flying toilets or rainbow zebras, he did relive past experiences in a random order. The only difference was he _knew_ they were data tracks and not real. Sometimes, the unpleasant ones felt worse when he noticed solutions he didn't think of at the time.

Optimus stared straight ahead, haunted.

"Hey." Mikaela pressed her hands against his shoulder. "Optimus, talk to me."

Blue optics regarded her, the outer corners turned down like his mouth.

"When I was inside the KSI factory...I saw a true nightmare." Optimus cringed, bound inside a memory too horrible to relive. "It was barbaric, Mikaela. They had the heads of my dead friends and foes alike hooked up to machinery. Sentinel, Megatron, Leadfoot..._Ratchet_...they _butchered_ them for their own experiments. And I was in stasis, helpless to save them from that fate! I-I..." he looked down at his hands, "-I should have been there! I have always been there for my men, my _friends_, and when they _needed_ me...when they needed _me_...grr!"

Optimus smashed his fists against his thighs. He clasped his hands together, almost like a human in prayer, and wiped at the inner corners of his optics with his thumbs. Finally, he hung his head and grimaced. Mikaela heard the pat-pat of wiper fluid droplets hitting the hardwood floor between his feet.

The most painful tears fell in silence. For Optimus, they were a voluntary affect- something he picked up after seeing her cry. Tears let him express himself when words failed.

Mikaela's eyebrows knit in sympathy towards his anguish. She laid her hand on his clenched fist and his fingers automatically opened to let her palm slide onto his. Through that simple touch, she offered her strength.

Pat-pat. Pat-pat. Like rain. A teardrop for every friend he couldn't save. He sat still as a statue, watching them fall.

Telling him it wasn't his fault wouldn't help. Telling him he had no control over the circumstances wouldn't help. Years of experience taught her how to listen to him. He didn't want advice, he wanted to be _heard_. So she waited patiently, letting him collect his thoughts.

Optimus blinked. The tears stopped. He squeezed Mikaela's hand and released it.

"Dwelling on their deaths will do no good. Neither will dwelling on the 'what ifs.'" He looked out the window near the bed, his optics faraway. "Yet I can't help it. I fear that the next time I turn around, I'll find you and Elita torn from my life, too."

He moved to punch the window. Then he thought better of it and paced around the foot of the bed instead, anxiously rubbing his left fist against his right palm. "Megatron is still out there, he calls himself Galvatron now. He exists in a bastardized shell with no Spark. I have never been afraid of other living beings before, but I fear him. I fear him because, when I looked into his optics, I saw a hint of _myself_."

His aimless pacing grew more convoluted, like he couldn't decide which way he wanted to go. The longer he wandered, the more upset he grew. He was a caged tiger busily testing a shrinking prison.

"A part of me still loves him, Mikaela. While I have no desire towards him, nor do I want to go back to him, I still hope for him to find peace." The pacing stopped abruptly, "Is it possible his Spark- the part of him that I love- is safe in the Allspark?"

He looked over, seeking an answer.

Mikaela swallowed hard. Typical Optimus- always thinking of others while beaten and lying facedown in a puddle of his own emotional blood. She'd long since accepted that he never stopped loving Megatron and didn't begrudge his expressing it. Tiny parts of her still loved Sam enough to mail him a "congratulations" card when she heard he got married to somebody named Carly, so she honestly understood where Optimus came from. Love was energy- it never died, it just shifted to other people and grew stronger through reciprocation.

"I dunno, Optimus. I hope so, I really do," Mikaela responded honestly.

Optimus nodded, apparently reassured until the pacing resumed. His troubled expression shifted through light and shadow. He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his index finger, stopped mid-step and let his shoulders slump. "When I first obtained the Seed, I wanted to take you and Elita someplace safe and cyber-form Earth myself. Why save a planet bent on destroying itself? Why save a world that sees me and my comrades as objects they can replace?"

There. The source of everything.

Optimus' troubles often presented themselves in layers like the cloudy bands surrounding Jupiter's Great Red Spot. Talking things out helped him navigate to the storm's core and calm it down.

Mikaela paused, frozen by his words. She honestly couldn't blame him, but the statement hit like a punch in the gut. Even worse, _she_ could remember once thinking the Autobots were nothing more than sophisticated machines. Programmed, extremely advanced, but not _alive_.

Then she saw Optimus cry on her prom night, and everything changed.

With that in mind, she replied, "Because that's not who you are."

He looked at her, his diamond stare shattering the space separating them. "Then _who_ am I?"

"You're the Beloved Protector," Mikaela said, using the English translation of his Cybertronian name. She met his eyes, her own fierce. "Freedom is the right of all sentient beings. Justice is the right of all sentient beings who seek freedom. Peace is the right of all sentient beings who bring justice. _That_ is who you are. You live up to the name, Optimus Prime, and you're gonna keep living up to it."

Blinking, slowly, he seemed to inhale. "No, Mikaela, _who_ am I to _you?_"

Mikaela got up and grabbed his face between her hands, making him focus on her.

"Everything."

Her answer softened the hardness in his optics. He took her hands and passed his thumbs lovingly across her knuckles. For the briefest moment a sad smile crossed his face.

"Years ago, when I encountered my ancestors in the Allspark, I met my mother. Prima, the first Prime. I asked him the same question, and he gave me the same response. I was _everything_ to him. I became _everything_ he hoped for. And the recent events leave me doubting whether or not I still live up to that image."

Mikaela pushed herself to stand on the bed, making herself taller than his human-sized hologram. He gazed upward at her, his dim optics wide and pleading. Even Optimus Prime, a warrior who spent eons fighting for his life and the lives of those he cared about, still needed outside approval once in awhile. Knowing he sought it from her made her love him more.

"Yeah, you do." She touched his shoulders. They were smooth as porcelain and cool under her palms. "You _do_."

His optics quivered. A genuine smile slowly broke through the seemingly endless shadows crossing his streamlined features. He lifted Mikaela off the bed, set her down on the floor and hugged her. She clung to him, desperate to absorb his pain so he didn't have to suffer so much.

"Thank you," said Optimus. His previously cool plating warmed. He linked his fingers together against her lower back and let his forehead touch hers. "I apologize for spoiling the mood with my baggage, Mikaela. Can we call this 'take two?'"

Mikaela blushed and traced the Autobot symbol on his chest. "Are you sure you're up for it right now?"

Optimus swayed her slightly back and forth, a subtle slow dance, his gentle gaze never leaving hers. The air between them heated like the ionized step leaders preceding a lightning strike. Already, he was making love to her through eye contact. He could turn her on from across a room with that look.

"I am," he spoke from the deepest register of his voice.

_That_ tone sent thunder, smoke and solar flares rippling through Mikaela's bones. She touched her forehead with the back of her hand and pretended to faint. Afterward, she giggled and looked up at him through her eyelashes. Two could play this game.

Feeling Optimus cringe when she caught herself on the armor protecting his Spark chamber revealed an even deeper need. Fighting a seemingly endless war hurt him terribly throughout the eons, but the human betrayal did worse damage to his psyche than all of that. He hoped her touch would erase the unwanted negative association of human hands and misery. He wanted to feel completely safe in her presence again.

Mikaela swore to offer him that comfort. She rose onto her toes and gently bumped her nose into his.

"C'mon," she nudged him. "I don't want to be quiet, and Elita might hear us if we get loud in here. That hill you landed on is perfect, so let's go up there."

Fifteen minutes later, Optimus and Mikaela reclined together in the hilly forest clearing. An orange picnic blanket lay spread out behind them, lit softly by the dancing flame of an old farmer's lantern Optimus found in the basement. Their feet faced south. A gibbous moon hung near the tree line at their left, and the Milky Way's towering haze dominated the blackness above the baseball diamond-sized circle of trees.

Mikaela glanced north towards Cassiopeia, which resembled an irregular letter M in the darkness. The largest 'point' of the M was an arrowhead marker for locating the constellation Andromeda. Or, rather, a wispy, dim star that didn't quite resolve in Andromeda's 'knee.' Messier thirty-one, the Andromeda galaxy and nearest spiral neighbor of the Milky Way, always appeared on the clearest nights. Mikaela knew she was only seeing a hint of its central bulge, that it would appear larger than the full moon if all of its stars were brighter. But at two-point-five million light years away, it held the record for the furthest observable naked-eye object.

What was Optimus doing the moment the light striking her eyes left that galaxy so long ago?

She didn't ask. She already knew.

Picking up the _Stargazer_ magazine that somehow got wadded up into the blanket, she gazed at an image of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. The light cast by those galaxies began its journey thirteen billion years ago, when Primes walked Cybertron. And their photons were just now striking Earth. Her attention returned to the faint wisp in Andromeda. Suddenly, it didn't seem all that far away.

"It's remarkable," Optimus pointed at exactly the object Mikaela studied so intently, "The Andromeda galaxy is going to collide with the Milky Way in four billion years."

Mikaela eyed the sky, "Gravity warps them into weird shapes, doesn't it?"

"Mmhmm. I find it fascinating how the stars in galaxies are so far apart that they won't collide when the galactic collision begins, but the interstellar dust is another story. Imagine a sky glowing with swaths of nebulae and stars as a new, massive elliptical galaxy takes shape. Seven billion years from now, that band of light to the south will be a white ball of stars taking up most of the sky. I...don't know what Earth's fate will be throughout all of this. Your sun will be near the end of its life by the time the process begins."

Awed, Mikaela moved to cover the Autobot symbol on Optimus' chest. The errant thought burning in her throat found its way out. "I'm almost thirty, you know."

"I'm ten billion and eight." He shrugged a shoulder. "Age is only a number."

"Yeah, but I won't be here a hundred years from now. Does that ever bother you?"

"At times, yes," he answered honestly.

Mikaela bit her bottom lip. "Me, too."

Optimus pushed himself up on his elbow to regard her. His optics leveled with her eyes, their soft glow expressing no sadness.

"I have no regrets, nor do I dwell on your transience. Your brevity lets me cherish _us_ even more. Life is about creating memories within moments, and those memories keep us afloat in this sea we call 'time.' And when the end of your life comes...yes, I will grieve and miss you. The sky behind me may change over the eons, Mikaela, but my love won't. If I am still alive in a trillion years, people from worlds born long after this conversation will hear me speak your name." He played with a lock of hair near her ear. "You and Elita are the best part of my life, and you always will be."

For the billionth time, Mikaela wondered if she dreamed this. Optimus just promised to speak her name on a distant planet that hadn't begun to form yet. And, though she didn't voice it, she hoped he wouldn't spend those distant years completely alone.

"For real?" she asked. "A trillion years?"

"And beyond, fate willing."

At that, Mikaela moved to brush the rebellious lock of hair over her shoulder. He'd woven it into a small braid.

"Hey..."

"Yes?"

She grasped Optimus' hands and thumbed the engraving adorning his left ring finger.

"Just want you to know...if your hologram breaks down, or something happens to you out in space...dammit I hope not, but if it does...I'll be okay. I won't pretend it's easy, but I'll go on. Elita's the reason I stayed sane these last four years. But I'm gonna be honest- I'll miss you like hell. You and Elita, you're the best parts of me. That won't change because you're not here. Um..."

Heat flooded her cheeks. Before she knew it she was giggling like a schoolgirl.

Optimus blinked. "What?"

"Um...oh, God, this is cheesy," Mikaela covered her face and peeked through her fingers. "When I was little- I'm talking five years old here- I used to wish for a knight in shining armor."

Optimus' eye ridges tilted upward at the inner corners, softening his war-hardened features, and a faint hint of purple briefly colored his blue optics.

"Well then, milady," he brought her hand to his mouth like a gentleman. "May I make a request?"

Blushing, Mikaela nodded.

"This knight is lost." Optimus guided her hand to his chest and his voice dropped like thunder. "Help me find myself again. Rediscover me."

She watched his pupils open into soft, glowing eclipses focused unwaveringly on her. Not pleading, but quietly asking- and he smiled. Just a little.

_It's the first time all over again...not for him, but for me. How many of us get that chance with the same amazing person?_

Mikaela gathered her dress skirt and swung herself over to straddle Optimus like she used to do. His segmented codpiece provided the perfect seat. Her hands went right for the complex metal constructing his neck. Ever since laid eyes on it, she wanted to touch it. She brushed her thumb over the facsimile of an Adam's apple; he didn't have that before and it amused her. His throat was a framework similar to a human's cervical spine, but on a larger scale to fully support his head. The fine, hair-thin neural wires weren't where she used to find them. In their place, metal strips serving the same function as sternocleidomastoid muscles. His equivalent to trapezius muscles were multistage telescoping hydraulic joints set further back. Those were new, too.

"Do _you_ know where everything is?" Mikaela teased.

"Actually, no," Optimus replied. He blinked, rubbing the back of his head. "I- haven't had time to fully scan myself. My systems were doing that when I, ah, slipped into recharge. The process was not able to complete."

"Oh. Sorry..."

"No, it's all right. I rather prefer this method of self-discovery."

Mikaela lightly kissed his brow. "I have a feeling-" she rubbed his ear finials, "-that these are still sensitive."

He chuckled as static followed her fingers. "Mm, a correct assessment."

She traced his ear finials to the base of his helm. Right at the point where the smooth, porcelain-like chrome tapered, her fingertips brushed hair-fine wires bundled together. Her growing knowledge about robot anatomy told her she just found neural clusters. Far more sensitive than neural wires alone. She poked her fingertips in and gently pinched.

Optimus' optics went wide. "Oh!"

"Found 'em," Mikaela grinned. "Two neural clusters under your helm."

The mechanisms in Optimus' throat bobbed like a swallow. Mikaela dropped her hands to his chest, fitting her fingers between the exposed rubber hoses below his red and blue breastplates. Neural wires loved to hide near hoses, pipes and Spark chambers. She found a network of them exactly where she expected.

At her touch, Optimus' optics flickered. He threw his head back with a low, mechanical moan. "Ahh, Mikaela, yes! By the Allspark!"

His breastplates lifted up. The armor in the middle of his chest split and swiveled to hide behind them, exposing his closed Spark chamber. Mikaela looked down at the slit of flickering blue-white light. Heat radiated from it to express his desire.

Touching the smooth outer rim made Optimus shrink back. His armor shifted inward, almost as if to repel her fingers. He tried not to let her see it. She did anyway and immediately lowered her hand.

"Should I avoid this for right now?"

"I would prefer that, yes," Optimus replied. He turned his head, ashamed. "I'm sorry...it's nothing you've d-"

"Optimus," Mikaela cupped his cheek and brought his face forward again. "It's fine. Tell me to stop if anything bothers you. _You_ set the pace, okay?"

Relief crossed his face plates. He nodded. "Please, continue."

Reassured, Mikaela resumed her tactile exploration. She discovered more hoses near his underarms. They garnered the same reaction as the tubing on his chest, so she played with them until the plating on his chest stopped pushing inward. Then, wrapping her arms completely around him, she found the spot where his triple exhaust pipes connected to his back. Mischief gleamed in her eyes. She curled her fingers and tickled them.

"Whoa!" Optimus almost jumped a mile.

"Still ticklish?"

"Yes...and more."

"Ooh." Mikaela smirked slyly and danced her fingers about the hot, curved piping.

Optimus started to chuckle- until that wasn't enough and he exploded into the same laugh she captured on her phone four years ago. Such a warm, friendly sound; she drank it in. Growing heat poured under her fingertips. Static shocks snapped at her nails. She varied between long caresses and quick flutters.

"Oh...don't stop- I'm going to-" Optimus couldn't formulate words through his merriment.

Suddenly, his Spark chamber doors sprang open.

Mikaela heard snapping noises and realized what was going on. Her jaw dropped in pleasant surprise. "You're getting off!"

"I- am- about to...yes!" Optimus grunted. Static laced his voice. "Keep going...please!"

Seconds later, blue-white light illuminated the neural wires hidden between his hoses and plating. Mikaela knew she had him when the hairs on her arms stood on end. His eye ridges rose and his optics started fluttering and squinting. The servomechanisms in his throat tightened. His hand flew up, grabbing his head as it cocked backwards. He tucked his lower lip plate behind the top one just like a typical man biting his lip at the moment of release, and the random grunting noises from his vocal unit became deep, rhythmic moans.

Mikaela's breathing quickened while she watched Optimus surrender. She _really_ missed seeing him overload.

"Ahh..." Optimus sank backwards. His Spark chamber doors closed again, though his protective outer armor remained open. He rested a moment, optics closed and expression content.

"Well, _that's_ new," Mikaela moved to tickle him once more. "Betcha it's worse now."

"Yes, it- oof! Wait." His left optic twitched, "...those nodes are still dissipating the charge. You're causing feedback."

Mikaela released the suddenly oversensitive pipes in tacit understanding. She had to teach him the same thing when he got past his concerns about touching her delicate female anatomy.

"Wow," he said again.

"Did I cycle your energon?" she teased as she curled up beside him. He still possessed his familiar post-overload smell- like engine grease and hot oil.

"I think you cycled everything. Which reminds me..." Now he was the one to roll over and assume a dominant position. He brought his face to her ear, his voice reaching dangerous depths, "Reciprocation is in order. May I proceed?"

Mikaela licked her lips and nodded in silent consent. Optimus' warm metal hands played her like a fine-tuned instrument. Her skin was on fire in seconds because he knew her so well. She let him ease her dress right off and toss it aside.

"Hm," Optimus bunched her underwear in his palm after slipping them down her legs. "I see you're anticipating me."

"Mmhmm." Mikaela snatched her panties from him and hung them off his ear finial. "Good thing you took 'em off when you did."

Optimus shook the panties off his head and flung them onto her discarded dress. "Yes, it _is_ fortunate, considering what awaits you."

"Ooh, bring it."

"As you wish."

He lowered his head and began teasing her breasts with his mouth. His lip plates were shockingly cold despite his recent overload. She liked it that way. Funnily enough, he used to be extremely apprehensive about hurting her until he saw her breastfeed a cranky, teething Elita. That finally convinced him to try.

His first attempt at a love-bite resulted in a mouthful of breast milk. _That_ was hilarious. Even funnier, he didn't care! He spat it out in an empty bottle and they went back to business. The new method of foreplay shot their sex life up into the stratosphere.

Mikaela gripped Optimus' ear finials when he captured a nipple between his lip plates and pulled to the point of almost-pain. Having a mouth that behaved like nipple clamps more than made up for his lack of a tongue. He pinched, nibbled and caressed, and in that instant she swore he'd never been gone.

"I missed you," Optimus purred against her collarbone. "I missed your softness..."

His right hand glided south and flipped palm-up. Using his index and pinkie fingers, he spread her open, pushed the remaining two fingertips inside and pressed upward towards her belly button. A trick he came up with all on his own after she taught him about the female G-spot, and it drove her _crazy_.

Those new fingertips were practically built for the task. Mikaela knew he nailed the right spot when she got a sudden urge to pee despite an empty bladder. She forgot about it once his fingers went into action. Their rough circular movements defied the soft adoration in his optics.

"Oh!" Mikaela gasped and chewed her bottom lip. Her forehead wrinkled in response to the waves of pleasure building beneath Optimus' touch. She felt him scissor his fingers and reflexively gripped the picnic blanket beneath her. "Ooh, shit, yes!"

He delivered the final blow by curling his thumb and stimulating her from the outside as well.

Mikaela's body stopped being her own. Heat rushed through her face and chest. Her abdominal muscles clenched, forcing her to bear down like she did in childbirth. A second later, the dull almost-ache grew until everything went into spasms. Fluid gushed out as she mewled like someone being murdered.

Optimus didn't stop until Mikaela's muscles ceased flailing. She collapsed backwards, panting, a fine sheen of sweat dampening her brow. Aftershocks rippled up her spine when he carefully slid his fingers out. She watched him rub his thoroughly lubricated fingertips together and glance downward.

"You shot me," he said, a look of amusement squinting his optics.

Mikaela managed to raise her head. She'd gushed all over his stomach.

"You were in the line of fire," she laughed.

Optimus chortled, drying his hand and stomach off on a corner of the blanket. "Now we are one for one."

Mikaela used one of the tissues she brought along to wipe herself. Her still-sensitive parts quivered at her own touch. She stashed the wadded tissue in the plastic Walmart bag next to the lantern.

"Yeah, but I'm not ready to close the shop yet."

"Neither am I."

Optimus' optics kept a laser-like bead on her actions. They were dark again, blue-hot eclipses expressing his desire. He waited patiently while Mikaela smoothed the blanket again and laid back. She beckoned him with a come-hither finger. He bent over her, his face replacing the stars in her field of view.

"Are you ready to continue?"

Giggling, Mikaela hooked her legs around his waist. "Oh, yeah."

Optimus leaned closer and nibbled her earlobe. He toyed with her ring and began speaking Cybertronian quietly in her ear. The musical quality of his native language sent goosebumps skittering along her skin. While Mikaela didn't understand every word, she picked up enough to fill in the blanks and put the meaning together.

"_With the stars as our witnesses, I, Optimus Prime, avow all that I was, all that I am and all that I will become to you. I place my life inside yours, and I swear to love and honor you with every pulse of my Spark. Through this promise, I am yours_."

They were bonding vows.

After he'd spoken, Optimus bared his Spark again and let Mikaela see inside the chamber. The top engraving was gone, leaving their family sigil alone at the bottom.

Mikaela blinked back tears. She asked Optimus to say the vows again so she could repeat them back using her own name. His optics, fierce, yet gentle, glowed with reawakened passion. He bent forward, interlocking their fingers. Their lips met- his metal to her skin- sealing the new promise.

"Forever," he whispered.

"Definitely," she whispered back.

Optimus smiled and revved his engine. His codpiece armor concentrated the vibrations right _there_.

"Ah!" Mikaela whimpered, her body tensing around itself.

Optimus' eye ridges went up. He glanced down between them. A rare, wicked expression graced his face and he started to rock his hips. Just slightly, yet that hint of motion intensified the vibrations nearly tenfold.

Mikaela grabbed onto his shoulders as he took her for the most intense ride of her life. Staying quiet was impossible. She pulled him against her, aligning her heartbeat to the Spark in his chest. The warmth of his body on her breasts nearly sent her screaming into ecstasy.

A low grunt escaped Optimus every time he revved his engine. When he opened his mouth, the grunts became growling moans. Sounds of passion he didn't try to hold back. He was as vocal as she was. Hearing him turned her on more. God, she missed all his little noises.

Mikaela gasped and sighed and gasped some more. Her brow knit and her lips pulled off her teeth in delightful almost-pain. Itchy tingling spread upward into her pelvis. Everything funneled to a single point in space and time.

Optimus' optics fluttered shut and opened again. Their eyes met. He embodied the electricity roaring through Mikaela's nervous system. Her pelvic muscles went into spasms. She pressed her cheek against his. It was happening..._happening_...

"More!" Mikaela panted.

If Optimus had teeth, they would've been clenched. His face contorted and a vicious, animalistic snarl of pure emotion rose off his vocal unit. A final engine rev shoved them both off the edge.

Reality went white as simultaneous bliss bound them like coalescing spiral galaxies. They clung to one another, gazes locked, while rainbow infinity consumed everything. On and on, wave after wave, her into him, him into her, burning and rolling and falling and flying and sinking gradually towards new equilibrium.

Optimus' hologram flickered without disappearing. He fell against Mikaela almost gracefully, looking at her through dazed, twinkling optics.

There wasn't an inch of Mikaela's body that didn't tingle. Exhausted- a good sort of exhaustion- she planted a sloppy kiss on his Prime sigil.

Optimus' optics regained their normal, gentle glow. He shifted and his hot mouth plates nuzzled her sweaty forehead.

"Mmmh."

His wordless post-overload rumble said it all.

Mikaela lifted her head, meeting his mouth with her lips. Optimus still tasted the same, like smooth steel, though salty from her sweat.

She heard his breastplates clank and the light of his Spark disappeared behind its protective armor. He realized he covered up too fast and moved to re-open himself, but she looked into his optics and placed a hand on his chest. The fact that he bared his Spark at all after what he endured spoke volumes- she wasn't about to push his injured comfort level past its limit.

Nodding, Optimus reclined and invited Mikaela to assume her usual position on his chest, which she happily did. Feeling his warm hands massage her shoulder blades made everything wrong in the world right again.

"This is going to be a long healing process," Optimus murmured.

"You're not doing it alone," said Mikaela. "I won't let you."

"I know, and that makes it bearable." He rumbled in her ear, "I love you, Mikaela."

Sometimes, Mikaela thought those words without saying them aloud. Optimus never had such qualms- when 'I love you' crossed his mind, he said it. He even went so far as to call her at work at least once per shift just to tell her he loved her. Always with that same smile in his voice.

She didn't realize what that sweet little exchange meant to her until she stopped hearing it. Listening to his soothing baritone proclaim his love again closed the door on his absence. Like childbirth, the pain of the past four years became a distant yet real speck in her memory.

"I love you, too, Optimus." A statement she vowed never to take for granted again.

Optimus' metal lips clicked against the crown of her head. His optics whirred and he tilted his head far back. "Oh, a shooting star."

Sleep tried to claim Mikaela's awareness, but she fought it off to stay with him.

"Make a wish," she said.

Optimus embraced her fully. "I don't need to."

Once more, Mikaela's heart sang. She looped her arms upward and grasped his shoulders, holding him as close as he held her.

"Me, either."

Then she put her head down near the musical zap-zap of his Spark, her eyes closed in contentment...

.o

...and they opened again to early morning fog outside the cabin window. Warm covers enveloped her naked body, keeping the dewy chill away.

Mikaela yawned, rolled over and found Optimus lying on his stomach beside her. He'd assumed his favorite uncomfortable-looking position: one leg bent and his cheek resting directly on his forearm. His other arm lay draped around her waist, keeping her close. He'd crawled under the covers with her.

Optimus' mouth plates weren't completely shut. The bottom one stuck out just a bit in a robot pout. He still did that in his sleep. Adorable.

Mikaela brushed her lips against the bridge of his nose. Optimus opened his optics, briefly disrupting his calm expression.

"Hey." She moved back an inch. "Sorry, did I wake you up?"

"Mmhmm...accidentally."

Autobots had no 'half-asleep' state- they were either conscious, recharging, in stasis, or dead. Still, somehow, Optimus managed to sound like someone pulled from deep slumber.

"Mikaela..."

"Hm?"

"May I lie in your arms for awhile?"

The way he asked was almost...shy.

Mikaela scooted her pillow over onto his forearm, smiling. He cooperatively lifted himself up a few inches while she wiggled herself into position. Then he laid his head gently against her shoulder, which hid his face in the curve of her throat. At first she worried about the edges of his helm poking her bare skin, but all she felt was porcelain smoothness- his head wasn't as heavy as it looked.

Mikaela slipped her arms around Optimus' neck and scratched her fingernails in little circles behind his upturned ear finial. A soothing gesture, according to him. Warm air escaped the gaps between his face plates- a robotic sigh of contentment.

"Better?" Mikaela asked.

"Mmh, yes. I apologize if this is inconvenient. I just-"

"Shhh." She kissed the top of his helm. "It's okay."

"My recharge cycle requires one more hour. Then I will know myself again." Optimus shifted slightly and his optics clicked shut. "I love you."

"Awesome. Love you, too, boss bot."

He smiled, relaxed in her arms...and rattled.

.o

.o

.o

"_You can sleep in my arms, you don't have to explain.  
When your heart's crying out, baby, whisper my name.  
'Cause I've reached out for you when the thunder is crashing up above,  
you've given me your love.  
And your smile like the sun that shines through the pain-  
that's why I'll be there_..."

- Celine Dion, "If That's What It Takes"


End file.
